Hockey leagues and governing bodies have historically struggled to rein in racist and physical abuse.
In some cases, these groups will often discipline the player who is the victim of the abuse instead of the party who initiated it.
These types of uneven punishments were documented in the book I coauthored, Game Misconduct: Hockey’s Toxic Culture and How to Fix It.
Among hockey parents of color — especially Black hockey moms and dads — they often tell themselves and their children, “Not if. When,” regarding racist abuse.
Many times they find themselves having to explain racism to white league officials who have no idea what it’s like to be a person of color in hockey.
And communications issues often compound the issues these players face.
On October 30, 2024, USA Hockey posted an article praising the efforts of the California Amateur Hockey Association’s (CAHA) anti-bullying and inclusion programming. The article quotes CAHA President Tom Hancock saying:
“We feel that [CAHA’s anti-bullying and inclusion programming] is helping, but we’re still absolutely certain that it only gets better over time. It’s all about education and trying to nurture empathy. It’s really something as a collective board of directors in the state that we have completely embraced. Hopefully time will show that it really has made a difference.”
A week later, CAHA suspended Liam-Niko Robinson, then 12, a biracial (Black and Asian) defenseman for the California Heat, son of Eric and Emily Robinson, for the physical assault of a spectator.
The suspension letter, which is pasted below, states that Liam-Niko is “summarily suspended” by CAHA from all USA Hockey-sanctioned activities.
The letter omits any knowledge of the events that led Liam-Niko to the moment when CAHA suspended him.
In November 2024, according to the Robinsons, an opposing player on the Tampa Bay Crunch team called Liam-Niko a “ni**er” during a game in a Nashville area hockey tournament sponsored by CAN/AM. Liam-Niko engaged in a physical altercation with that player and was ejected from the game.
Later on, outside of the rink in the spectator area, Emily Robinson, Liam-Niko’s mother, was confronted by Kelly Nipper, the mother of one of the Crunch players, and the wife of Jeremy Nipper, a Crunch assistant coach.
Liam-Niko saw Kelly Nipper confront his mother and shoved her into the bleachers. Then an unidentified man grabbed Liam-Niko by his neck and threw him into the glass. Parents and rink officials attempted to regain control of the situation, but tensions escalated and the police were called.
Liam-Niko’s father, Eric Robinson, whose career background consists of expertise in de-escalation techniques and child welfare, assessed the situation.
He’s a Black man in the South trying to protect his family while trying to figure out what happened.
“At the end of the second [period], I see my son just start hauling off on a kid. And I’m like: ‘What’s going on? He’s a defenseman, but this is different. And so he gets ejected from the game,” Eric Robinson says. “He comes off the ice, he’s bawling, and I’m like: “Chin up. Let’s go to the locker room. We’ll handle this, and he says, the kid called me a n—-r. I said, Oh, okay, let’s turn around. Point out the kid who said it; he pointed the kid out. I said; ‘Okay, I’ll handle it after the game.”
Emily Robinson, like her husband, witnessed a different side of their son in that moment.
She went to him to see what was happening and noticed that a woman, whom turned out to be Kelly Nipper, was heading towards her.
“… I don’t think she came seeking me out. I think it was convenient that I was there… She puts a hand on my chest and with one hand in my face, and one hand on my chest, and says: ‘Get your f—–g kids in order,’” Emily Robinson said. “Had no clue who she was, but my initial reaction was: ‘Okay, let’s go’ because she was in my face and had pushed me, so I was ready.
“… My hands were inside my pockets when this happened. So as I’m taking my hands out of my pocket, my husband comes running in to separate us — to push us apart — and Liam [-Niko] comes in simultaneously, and he pushes the lady into the benches, and she falls on her butt on the benches, and that’s when the brawl just broke out.”
The video of the incident, which I viewed, showed the on-and off-ice incidents, was pulled from LiveBarn, an app that streams youth and amateur sporting events.
Liam-Niko’s teammate (we are withholding his name as he’s a minor), backs up the Robinsons’ claims, saying he heard the racial slur used by the Crunch player.
“I was Liam’s D partner during the moment when I heard #13 on the Tampa Bay Crunch say a racial slur directed at Liam Robinson. I was partnered with him for this game. He is a kind person, and I do not believe with any doubt that he would intentionally hurt someone for no reason,” said Liam’s teammate.
So here’s a timeline of the events:
1. Liam Robinson is called a racial slur by a player on the opposing team.
2. Liam is ejected from the game and waits in the locker room for a few minutes before leaving the locker room, standing at the boards to watch the rest of the game and to support his teammates.
3. [player] is ejected for boarding/body checking from behind. He joins Liam, where he watches the game from the sideline.
4. [player] is being led off of the ice by a ref after getting into a fight. As this occurs (as seen in the LiveBarn footage) a parent of one of the players on the Tampa Bay Crunch walks directly to Mrs. Robinson, who immediately tries to de-escalate the situation as seen on video. The angry parent keeps moving towards Mrs. Robinson, putting her hands on Mrs. Robinson, initiating the encounter. Liam, seeing that his mother was being assaulted, in an effort to separate the potentially violent woman from his mom, forcefully moves the angry parent away from his mom. Immediately after this, the husband (I believe) of the angry parent moves towards Liam, putting him into a head-lock type hold, forcefully pulling him out of the group.
5. After the game has ended, the police hold a small group meeting with the parents of both sides and review the incident. The angry parent lies, saying that she was just trying to see her son, who was on the ice. As seen in the LiveBarn footage, this is untrue, as she is seen briskly walking directly to Mrs. Robinson, and engaging physical contact.
In addition, California Fire officials, including the team manager and team parents, wrote statements in support of Liam-Niko. One parent’s statement of what they witnessed was also shared with Nashville police officials.
Ahead of a December 2024 hearing with CAHA and the Robinsons, Kelly Nipper sent an email to Hancock detailing her version of events that took place at the CAN/AM tournament, saying in part:
“The behavior from the California Heat players, especially #52, (on the ice, and on the sideline) is detrimental to the spirit of youth hockey and everything it stands for. Unfortunately, it was very apparent that the adults associated with the Heat not only provide zero accountability, but encourage this type of bad behavior. This is not what youth sports are about, and I know this is not what USA Hockey stands for.”
Nipper’s email to CAHA did not mention the racial slur from her son’s teammate that started the incident, her confrontation with Emily Robinson, the man connected to the Crunch grabbing Liam-Niko by the neck and throwing him into the boards, or the past tweets of her husband.
Jeremy Nipper’s past tweets (see below) from a now-deleted account — which I shared with USA Hockey, AdventHealth Center Ice, the Crunch’s home rink, and CAN/AM — consisted of his Atlanta Falcons fandom, his support of George Zimmerman’s acquittal of a second-degree murder charge after fatally shooting Florida teen Trayvon Martin, and a joke about Father’s Day in the “Ghetto.”
Kelly Nipper, AdventHealth Center Ice, and CAN/AM did not respond to my requests for comment.
Unfortunately, the Robinsons are facing off against a theme well-known to Black folks: A White woman weaponizing law enforcement and the criminal justice system.
According to the Robinsons, Rosemary Voulelikas, CAHA’s 1st Vice President, stated that the focus of the December 2024 hearing was the alleged assault of Nipper by Liam-Niko, completely ignoring how the racist incident erupted.
I reached out to 31 of the CAHA board members listed on the league’s website, including Hancock, Voulelikas, Rick Hutchinson, who chairs the Adult and Disciplinary/Dispute Resolution Committees, and Lameka Bell, the Director of Diversity & Inclusion.
At press time, CAHA’s board members have not responded to my requests for comment.
The Robinsons were informed by their source close to CAHA that Hancock instructed Board members not to respond to my requests for comment.
The Robinsons told me that they have yet to receive a recording of the December 2024 hearing from CAHA after they were told they’d receive one. In addition, they asked CAHA to identify the man who grabbed Liam-Niko and threw him into the board during the November 2024 melee.
The Robinsons continue to wait for an update.
The CAHA board members probably think they did the right thing by sitting Liam-Niko down for a while. However, they might have unintentionally criminalized a young biracial child — who presents Black — who told anyone who would listen, including CAHA’s board members, he was protecting his mother from an attack.
In short, CAHA appears to have condemned Liam-Niko in a way that puts Black hockey players through a prosecutory gauntlet that leaves them scarred.
The incident involving Matt Petgrave exemplifies this.
In 2023, Petgrave, who is Black, was arrested on suspicion of manslaughter in the aftermath of him colliding with another player during a game, causing his skate to elevate and cut that player in the neck. The player, Adam Johnson, later died of his injuries.
Although Petgrave was eventually cleared in the matter, some hockey fans seem to believe the incident was racially motivated, calling for him to be jailed, even though some of Johnson’s teammates said otherwise.
It remains to be seen if Petgrave recovers from the incident.
These are the scars that linger after realizing that hockey isn’t for everyone.
For Game Misconduct, I talked to the brother of a hockey player. He told me that his brother, due to his experiences, won’t allow his children to play despite showing interest:
“My family, it was my older brother who was put in and got turned off. … But all my cousins played hockey, and one by one, they all sort of faded out of that and moved on to other sports, in part because of their experiences. I think that they never relayed that love or wanted to put that experience onto their kids.”
So what are the Robinsons looking for?
They want Liam-Niko to have the chance to earn a spot on a team, which he has.
And, they’d like USA Hockey to overhaul its discipline procedure training for coaches, officials, and board members.
However, USA Hockey, the governing body of all things American hockey, employs former NHL goaltender John Vanbiesbrouck as its assistant executive director of hockey operations.
In 2003, Vanbiesbrouck, then general manager and head coach for the Ontario Hockey League’s (OHL) Soo Greyhounds, stepped down after a local newspaper reporter exposed that the former New York Rangers and Florida Panthers goaltender referred to Trevor Daley, a Black man and team captain, as a “little ni**er” on at least two occasions.
Although Vanbiebrouck admitted to being a racist and apologized to the OHL, he has yet to grant the same privilege directly to Daley himself.
I also reached out to USA Hockey — including Vanbiesbrouck — for comment but they declined.
In response, the Robinsons created an IG account named “CA Hockey Check,” which links to a petition describing that CAHA “thrives in secrecy.”
“Just there being no accountability. The more I talked to people behind the scenes, it seemed as though this was a pattern of behavior, not just for CAHA, but just for people of color — Black folks in hockey, and ultimately, after my wife and I talked. We got to the point where, worst case scenario,[ Liam-Niko] is going to be suspended for a year through November, with a two-year probation.
“That concerned me because at this point it’s like, okay, so if he sneezes, are you taking [Liam-Niko] off the ice? And so part of it was just to be heard, but then also just fearing retaliation in the future. Also, to have some sort of public paper trail.”
So should CAHA have done more to help Liam-Niko?
That’s a fair question since more and more families of color — particularly Black families — are entering the sport.
More than 20 players of color — half of them Black — were taken in the 2025 NHL Draft. Additionally, women’s hockey continues to make a significant impact.
The Robinsons’ main takeaway from the original incident, and everything that followed, is that every decision — whether justified in the moment or not — has consequences.
“This is exactly why kids don’t speak up when something traumatic actually happens to them, because they’re being told they’re not going to be heard, said Emily Robinson. “What they went through doesn’t matter unless someone else hears it, or goes through it as well.
“… And I said: ‘That’s the reality; even doing the right thing also has consequences, and that’s the message I keep giving [Liam-Niko]. I said: ‘You tried to defend yourself. There was a consequence. You defended mommy. There was a consequence. I said: ‘Do you regret doing any of those things? He said, No. And I said: ‘Okay, do you feel like you did something wrong? He said, No. And I said: ‘Okay, but there is a consequence. And I said: ‘You have to be okay with those consequences…”
The Robinsons, who are therapists by trade, say the original incident has changed the way Liam-Niko plays hockey.
And now they don’t want their youngest son, Kai-Zion, to play the sport.
“Now, I’m like: ‘No, you’re not getting another one of my kids…’” Eric Robinson said. “As a father, as a husband, I had to escort my entire family to the car after a hockey game for their safety and to get this response afterwards. No, you’re not getting one more of my kids. I’ll be here as long as my 13-year-old wants to play… I would be a fool to hand you another.”
